The Friends We Long to Have
by TheSummerNightingale
Summary: Hermione Granger is watching her two best friends play Quidditch. Being a girl who is passionately indifferent to the sport, it's only natural that she should feel left out.


**Written for Hogwarts, Potions 3 - Pewter: Write about someone feeling left out.**

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Hermione Granger sat on the cold Gryffindor bleachers surrounding the Quidditch pitch. She held a book in her gloved hands, but she was not reading. Wind whipped through her thick mane of hair and she shivered, curling inward as she watched the two boys on the pitch.

Harry was calling out something about the "Bludger", which, he and Ron had explained, was the orange they had nicked from the kitchens. The "Quaffle" was an apple because, and they'd thought themselves very clever for this, in the real game, the Quaffle was red. Finally, the "Snitch" was a pear. This was simply because there was no other available fruit in the kitchens that was large enough to throw in the air.

It was rather comical scene from a viewer's standpoint, but there was obviously nothing comical about lobbing fruit at one another to Harry and Ron. The boys were seated on their broomstick, juggling the bright fruits as they competitively zoomed up and down and around the pitch.

"You're going to crash into the post!" Hermione shrieked out when Ron flew dangerously close to one of the goal hoops. Never mind the fact that she'd promised them she was completely uninterested in their sport and would be reading the entire time (she'd only gotten past two pages).

Ron dodged the post just before he crashed, and let out a whoop of delight. Hermione realized, then, that he hadn't heard her at all, and if he had, it wouldn't have mattered - he was risking his life on _purpose_.

She opened her mouth to reprimand him, but shut it as Harry, laughing, flew over and tossed the apple to Ron. The boys began to circle the hoops and toss the fruit back and forth using the circles.

Hermione sighed as she not-so-discreetly watched them. Flying was the one topic she had absolutely no knowledge about, and it happened to be the same topic that her two best friends prized above all.

It wasn't for lack of trying that Hermione didn't enjoy learning about flying. She had _tried_, alright. Hermione didn't believe in the act of giving up, but part of her knew for certain that no matter how hard she tried, she would never love flying. She could never be even mediocre at it, and she would certainly never _want_ to fly.

She sighed again, tucking her legs onto the cold, desolate benches of the Gryffindor stands. She was the only person sitting in the bleachers.

The audience of a two-person game, she thought wryly. The outsider looking in on the team.

It wasn't the boys' _fault_ that they liked flying so much while she detested it. It wasn't as if they purposely tried to leave her out, and that was the worst part for Hermione.

As horrible as it sounded, she couldn't find anyone to blame.

"Hermione!"

Hermione's head shot up at the sound of her name. To her delight, Harry and Ron were both speeding towards her. She eagerly jumped up and waited until they were close enough to hear her to speak.

"Oh, you guys are done? Perfect! It's getting rather chilly out here, isn't it? I'll bet the library's really nice. Or the common room, we could go there. Whichever you'd prefer. We could go to the kitchens and visit Dobby, Harry. He wasn't there this morning, but he's probably back now-"

"Can't really hear you!" Harry said as he pulled to a stop in front of her. "Can you hold the pear for a moment? We wanted to play a different game."

Ron tossed the pear to Hermione, who just barely managed to catch it. "Thanks, Hermione! You're the best."

The boys turned their broomsticks back towards the open pitch. "Oh, yeah," said Harry, stopping his broomstick and looking over his shoulder at her. "What were you saying?"

Hermione's mouth parted, but she closed it and shook her head, cupping the pear in her hands. "Nothing," she said detachedly. "Go on."

They went. How could she blame them?

She sat on the bleachers again and tossed the pear from hand to hand. It was warm from the boys' touches, and she protectively clutched the fruit as she watched Harry and Ron weave through the posts, yelling, shouting, laughing like only boys could.

Hermione stayed frozen in her seat until how many minutes or hours later she did not know. She watched her two friends act like boys and longed to be on a broomstick next to them. She bitterly resented the _whoosh_ of the brooms, the satisfying sound of apple hitting hand. And she held tightly to the pear, whose warmth was long gone by the time the boys landed on the ground and shouted up to her, "Want to go in now, Hermione?"

She did. Oh, how she did.

She stalked out of the stands and brushed past where Harry and Ron stood, waiting for her.

"Did you have fun?" she asked.

She didn't need to look to know they were exchanging alarmed glances at her short tone.

"Er, yeah," said Ron.

"It was a nice break from studying," said Harry.

"Good," she said, and she meant it but didn't. Hermione suddenly tossed the pear towards Ron, who swore and dove to catch it. "Here."

She turned on her heel and began to swiftly walk up to the castle. She couldn't hear the scuffle of footsteps behind her. _Fine_, she thought venomously to herself. She folded her arms. _Fine. Let them be_.

And then the pear came soaring over her head and landed in the path ahead of her. Hermione sucked in a breath as she halted abruptly, staring at the green fruit on the ground.

After a moment's hesitation, she spun around and said angrily, "What was that for? You could've hit me!"

Her mouth opened in further indignation as Harry and Ron began to crack up. "Honestly," Hermione spat, but it was with less fury than annoyance. "You could at least have alerted me."

"You look like McGonagall," snorted Harry, and the boys succumbed to fresh peals of laughter.

Hermione scowled as she stooped to pick up the pear. "Here," she grunted, holding it out to Harry.

"Oh, no," said Harry, shaking his head. "It's yours. See, I've got the orange, Ron's got the apple, and you've got the pear."

She frowned and eyed the fruit warily. "And that's supposed to signify…?"

Harry shrugged. "Nothing really. Just-" He hesitated.

"You like pears, don't you?" Ron asked as he straightened himself, still laughing.

Her previous annoyance and irritation faded. "Well, yes," she said, rather confused.

"Alright then! Everything works out. Come on, let's go." Ron marched ahead, twisting the stem of the apple.

She raised her eyebrow at his back and turned to Harry, who was peeling his orange. He smiled at her. "Let's go," he beckoned, and caught up to Ron.

"Where are we going?" Hermione jogged up to the boys, who were both eating their fruit.

Ron rolled his eyes at her. "To the library, of course."

"The _library_?" Hermione openly gawked at the boys. The last time they had volunteered to go to the library on a Friday night was back in first year, when they'd been searching up information about Nicholas Flamel.

"Where else?" Harry shook his head.

"Erm, _well_," said Hermione disbelievingly. "I thought you guys might want to do other things. Like visit Hagrid, for instance. Visit Dobby. Go back to the common room. Other stuff."

"Hermione, of course we'd rather do those things," said Ron exasperatedly.

"But you don't _really_. Not to say you don't care about Hagrid or Dobby. It's just that you've got that Potions essay to finish."

"Yeah. And you like to finish homework on Fridays."

"Which I don't get, but-" Harry stopped walking and looked back. "What're you doing?"

For Hermione had abruptly stopped in her tracks, and was staring at the boys with her mouth hung open. Her nails were digging into the flesh of the pear, and her feet appeared to be rooted to the ground.

"Hermione?" Ron asked uncertainly. "Are you… you know, okay?"

She closed her mouth and opened it again. "I-" she said faintly. "Yeah." Hermione smiled slightly, and something in her heart stirred. "Yeah."

"So the library?" Harry asked hesitantly.

"You know what?" Hermione slowly shook her head. "How about we got to the Gryffindor Tower? We can play Exploding Snap, or even Wizard's Chess."

Harry and Ron shared a cautious glance as Hermione sauntered past them, nodding decisively to herself. "Yes, we have that pack of Exploding Snap cards still. I've got a couple Chocolate Frogs leftover, too. We can bring them all down, have some fun in the common room-"

Ron blinked at her then said cheerily, "Well, that sounds swell, if you insist."

"And you're really sure, Hermione? We did make you come out here and all-"

Hermione put her elbows on Harry's and Ron's shoulders. A spurt of love and affection for her friends flowed through her veins, and a large smile crept onto her face as she said, "Positive."

In the end, it didn't matter that they were boys and she was a girl. They were her friends, and that was all that mattered.


End file.
